Afrikology, Philosophy and Wholeness

How do we understand and create kowledge? Does scientific knowledge cover all knowledge? Afrikology tries to answer these questions by tracing the issue of epistemology to the Cradle of Humanity in Africa and through such a reflection the Monograph establishes a basis for holistic and integrated ways of knowledge production that makes it possible to interface scientific knowledge with other forms of knowledge. In this way Afrikology responds to the crisis created by the fragmentation of knowledge through existing academic disciplines. Afrikology therefore advances transdisciplinarity and hermeneutics to a level where they attain a coherent basis for interacting with Afrikology as an epistemology which returns wholeness to understanding and knowledge production.

Cover

Title Page

Copyright Page

Contents

Introduction

Afrikology, as an epistemology of knowledge generation and application
that has roots in African Cosmology, emerges at a time of extreme
complexity in global economic and social relations, the physical
environment and human history...

Afrikology and the African Heritage

In this case, therefore, Afrikology seeks to retrace the evolution of
knowledge and wisdom from its source to the current epistemologies, and
to try to situate them in their historical and cultural contexts, especially
with a view to establishing...

Greek and Western dualisation and abstraction of reality

Greek philosophers such as Plato and Aristotle are correctly blamed for
having created a false hierarchisation of principles arising out of their
search for ‘perfect’ knowledge due to their inadequate experiences in
Egypt. Plato, in particular...

The implications of the quantum and relativity revolution for consciousness

According to Diop, an attempt to restore balance in human self-understanding
must begin with the creation of the contours of knowledge
from their sources in order to create coherence in human cognitive powers.
As far as those processes of knowledge creation are concerned...

Divination, shamanism and wholeness

Before we get to address the issue of a new philosophy and epistemology,
let us look at some of the theories and practices that are still to be found in
African and other societies, but which help one to understand the integrated
nature of reality and knowledge...

The African Chicane, witchcraft and divination

According to Cornelius, the metaphor of the Chicane has ramifications for
the study of hermeneutics, which enables us to extend our understandings
beyond the traditional culture and the limits of divination itself. The
Chicane, which on the one hand manifests...

Femininity, knowledge and Afrikology

One of the cardinal requirements of Afrikology is the feminine principle in
African consciousness and existence, which we must re-assert as we strive
to rejuvenate African knowledge sources. This has been an aspect that
Western epistemology has tried to undermine...

Dialogue between the ancient African worldview and the modern Western view

The presentation of the experiences from shamanism and divination
demonstrates the unity that still exists between human knowledge, human
action and nature. This means that any attempt to erect a barrier between
them leads to human disorientation...

The problem of reason and rationality

The problem with the modern ‘hope’ is that its realisation has proceeded
along the path in which reason has been understood in a spiral dialectical
fashion, as understood by Hegel, and which Marx saw as being ‘upside
down’. The conception turned what was conceived...

The problem of dialects and oppositionality

One other area of contention which requires dialogue between the African
ancient wisdom and the modern Western worldview is dialectics as a
method, which ‘reason’ has promoted. It was in the 18th century that
Emmanuel Kant developed his concept...

The central role of language

One of the central areas of dialogue – and essential to the recreation
of a holistic thinking – is the dialogue between the modern Western
understanding of the role of language in the creation of knowledge and the
ancient African understanding...

Towards Afrikology and a new philosophy

In trying to answer the question as to whether an African philosophy
exists, Diop points out that in the Western classical sense of the term,
philosophical thought must bear out at least two fundamental criteria: it
must be conscious of itself...

Afrikology, hermeneutics and understanding

It is significant from the point of view of an Afrikology of knowledge that
when the crisis of the modern scientific epistemologies began to manifest
itself significantly in the consciousness of some of the mainstream
thinkers, the only recourse...

Why Afrikology is different from other African approaches

We have defined Afrikology as an epistemology – a philosophy of knowledge
production – emanating from the Cradle of Humanity in Africa. We have
demonstrated that it is not an ethno-centric philosophy but geographical in
that it was first...

Afrikology as a universal emancipatory epistemology

Based on the inspiration and epistemologies from the Universal Cradle
of Humanity in Africa, Afrikology seeks to build on the achievements of
African people and the rest of humanity in order to emancipate themselves
from the dehumanisations...

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